United front will be critical for passage of the 2018 farm bill

Commodity groups have accomplished some miraculous feats of legislative power by sticking together in the past. Although often outnumbered, their congressmen have passed farm bills that kept many of their members in business.

But some fissures are already developing within and between some of the organizations as they prepare for the 2018 farm bill, including an increasing divisiveness over the issues of generic acres and farmers’ base acres.

Congressman Austin Scott says farmers must learn to bridge those gaps now and, even more importantly, in the future as Congress becomes less rural and more urban through reapportionment. He was a speaker at the Southern Peanut Farmers Federation annual conference in Sandestin, Fla.